OEM Disk Question(s)

[Victor]

Greetings,

The company I work for had 12-15 PCs built for them a few years ago with XP
Pro (OEM). They all have their little stickers on the side. The company
that built them has since "disappeared". I am in there now and need to
reinstall XP Pro on all the machines. Can I use an OEM CD from elsewhere to
do this (and enter the Serial #'s, COA, etc... from the sticker). They
already paid for the OS.


Thanks in Advance

 

[Ron Martell]

Greetings,

The company I work for had 12-15 PCs built for them a few years ago with XP
Pro (OEM). They all have their little stickers on the side. The company
that built them has since "disappeared". I am in there now and need to
reinstall XP Pro on all the machines. Can I use an OEM CD from elsewhere to
do this (and enter the Serial #'s, COA, etc... from the sticker). They
already paid for the OS.

Those computers with the OEM stickers on the side probably used the
generic OEM version of Windows provided by Microsoft to the smaller
OEMs and assemblers. The OEM disk you want is one that has only the
Microsoft name and logo on it and says "for sale or distribution only
with a new computer" or words to that effect. An OEM disk that has
the name and/or logo of a computer manufacturer on it will most likely
not work with your generic product keys.

p.s Why do you need to reinstall all of them? That is the equivalent
of Capital Punishment and should be reserved for only the most serious
situations. With Windows XP most problems can be fixed and/or
recovered from without having to resort to a reformat.

Good luck

Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada
--
Microsoft MVP (1997 - 2006)
On-Line Help Computer Service
http://onlinehelp.bc.ca
Syberfix Remote Computer Repair

"Anyone who thinks that they are too small to make a difference
has never been in bed with a mosquito."

 

[Victor]

p.s Why do you need to reinstall all of them? That is the equivalent
of Capital Punishment and should be reserved for only the most serious
situations. With Windows XP most problems can be fixed and/or
recovered from without having to resort to a reformat.

Good luck

Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada

I need to reinstall for a few reasons. One, no one knows the Administrators
passwords (and the users who they were set up for are long gone). Even the
ones I can log onto, I can't run TaskMgr, Regedit nor install certain
soft/hard ware.

Second, they were set up to log onto a server and that server is gone. I
have the time to reinstall, I call it (temporary) job security